For years this photo, taken somewhere in central London during a June 2013 press junket for Edgar Wright‘s The World’s End, has tickled my brain. I can’t get it out of my head. There’s something about the communal gaiety of these obedient Wright fanboys, ecstatic and euphoric about hanging with their hero + their place on the promotional gravy-train express…I keep coming back to it.

If only I’d managed to become (or at least simulate being) a Wright worshipper, I too might have been part of one of the most iconic (and odious?) Hollywood fraternity photos of the 20teens….if only I hadn’t triple-hated Scott Pilgrim vs. The World…if only Baby Driver (three-quarters of which I genuinely liked) had come out before The World’s End…a lot of variables.

Who am I kidding? I’ve never felt much of an aesthetic kinship with the fellows in this photo…well, now and then & here and there as it might be, depending on the film, but they’re basically genre & fantasy geeks and fools for Wright and I’ll never be either…and even if I’d been there I probably would have avoided posing for this shot, not being a drinker and all.

Wright might some day make another film that works as well as Baby Driver…maybe. Last Night in Soho sure as hell missed the mark in more ways than one, and so he’s “down” right now. But he’ll be back on his feet before long.

(l. to. r) Hitfix’s Drew McWeeny, Todd Brown of Twitch, Edgar Wright of A Fistful of Fingers, Harry Knowles of Ain’t It Cool News, Jordan Hoffman of Screencrush, Devin Faraci of Badass Digest, Germain Lussier of Slashfilm, Alex Billington of First Showing, Eric Vespe of Ain’t It Cool News, Silas Lesnick of Coming Soon and Steve “Frosty” Weintraub of Collider.

Generally speaking the disparity between critic and audience scores on Rotten Tomatoes, Metacritic and IMDB is fairly consistent. More of than not it’s (a) critics are fine with a film but the audience isn’t or (b) vice versa.

How then to explain the different audience scores for Kenneth Branagh‘s Belfast? 91 on Rotten Tomatoes, 7.4 on IMDB, and 63 on Metacritic — a 28-point spread between Metacritic and RT!

Jordan Ruimy: “The readership for Metacritic tends to be a little more highbrow than Rotten Tomatoes.” More than a little, I’d say, when it comes to Belfast.

Critics mean nothing these days. 90% are woke sheep, herd mentality whores. Audience scores are what finally count in the end.

The opening of Alfred Hitchcock’s Lifeboat (‘44) meets the spirit of Omicron Christmas.

Yesterday Hollywood hotshot and cultural pulse-taker Lewis Beale sent his annual movie milestone list. I’ve included HE counter-opinions in some instances. Here, again, is HE’s 12.19.21 list of the year’s 30 finest films.

The Best: ‘Riders of Justice,’ ‘Pig,’ ‘Prayers for the Stolen,’ ‘A Hero,’ ‘The Power of the Dog,’ ‘The Hand of God,’ ‘Licorice Pizza’.” / HE: I have to presume Beale hasn’t seen “Parallel Mothers.”

The Worst: ‘Annette,’ ‘Cry Macho,’ ‘The Many Saints of Newark,’ ‘The Tomorrow War,’ ‘The Woman In the Window,’ ‘Titane,’ ‘Bliss,’ ‘The Lost Daughter,’ ‘The Mitchells vs. The Machines,’ ‘The Unforgivable.’

Overrated: ‘Passing,’ ‘In the Heights,’ ‘Drive My Car,’ ‘Petite Maman’.

Underrated: ‘Benedetta,’ ‘The Eyes of Tammy Faye’

Guilty Pleasures: ‘Godzilla vs. Kong,’ ‘Copshop’

Biggest Disappointment: ‘Summer of Soul’ (too much talk, not enough music)

Films You Couldn’t Make Me Watch Even If You Waterboarded Me: ‘The French Dispatch,’ ‘Ghostbusters: Afterlife,’ ‘Halloween Kills,’ anything from the MCU. / HE insists that this year Beale got it wrong about the MCU, and I’m saying an an MCU hater for the most part — Spider–Man: No Way Home really and truly hits a grand slam during its final hour.

If Pornhub Were In the Feature Film Business: ‘Bad Luck Banging Or Loony Porn’ (Yes, this is the title of a real Romanian film)

I never thought I’d say that Marvel honcho Kevin Feige, whom I’ve regarded as a demonic force over the last seven or eight years… I never thought I’d wholeheartedly endorse the idea of a Spider-Man film being nominated for a Best Picture Oscar, but right now I agree with him.

Brian Desmond Hurt and Alistair Sim‘s A Christmas Carol (’51) will always be the finest version of Charles Dickens‘ holiday tale, and the 2011 Bluray version is easily the best-looking — excellent detail, mine-shaft blacks, wonderful monochrome palette. Then I came upon this new 4K version on YouTube, completely free and deserving of the highest praise. It might even be a touch better than the Bluray.

One dreams that in honor of the life and lore of the great Joan Didion, who passed yesterday at age 87…one imagines that an HD scan of Frank Perry‘s 1972 adaptation of Didion’s Play It As It Lays — a film that totally captures the detached Didion mood and vaguely nihilistic disdain she felt about this town — might finally be streamed.

You can watch the movie and read Didion’s book at the same time. They’re almost the same thing.

I accepted a long time ago that this film will never be HD’ed or streamed. Somebody out there really hates it with a passion, and wants it kept on YouTube.

It’s the most curiously arresting film ever made about cold, jaded, corroded Hollywood. Weld’s performance as sad, spaced-out Maria (pronounced Mar-EYE-ah) Wyeth is easily her best ever.

Kim Morgan: “Play It As It Lays floats and swerves and cuts with observations and weirdly timed statements throughout, brilliantly matching the fragmented time fame and switching POV of Didion’s novel, while wandering from place to place and person to person with Maria’s depressed but succinct sensitivities.

“It’s often genius-level, and so the fact that Play It As It Lays was poorly to adequately received at the time (though Roger Ebert loved it) seems unjust to me. Many critics thought it very pretty, and Weld and Perkins fantastic (they are), but very empty (it’s not, and it is, precisely the point). Or that Perry was all wrong for Didion (he’s not).

“Didion’s novel has sometimes single-paragraph sentences, terse observations met with deadpan responses, and Perry visualizes her manner stunningly. And he does so as a Perry film, not just a Didion film — this is what happens when another is helming your own work, even if you write the screenplay — you cannot control your narrative once it’s in the eyes of the other beholder.”

I loved Dominick Dunne‘s Joan Didion: The Center Will Not Hold (Netflix). Well worth watching